Computer viruses make it to orbit

A computer virus is alive and well on the International Space Station (ISS), reports The BBC.

Nasa has confirmed that laptops carried to the ISS in July were infected with a virus known as Gammima.AG.

The worm was first detected on Earth in August 2007 and lurks on infected machines waiting to steal login names for popular online games.

The FBI this week arrested a Los Angeles-area blogger on suspicion of violating federal copyright laws after he allegedly streamed tracks of the unreleased Guns N' Roses album, Chinese Democracy, on his Web site, says CNet.

Kevin Cogill, 27, caused quite a stir when he allegedly began streaming nine songs from the album, which has been 15 years in the making, on his blog Antiquiet. The traffic crashed his site almost immediately, and shortly afterward the songs were removed at the band's request. But users who recorded the streams quickly made the songs available on file-sharing sites. It's unknown how Cogill allegedly acquired the material.

The FBI began investigating the incident in late June, and earlier this week Cogill posted a plea for legal help on his blog, writing that, "more and more each day, it looks like I may be indicted".

UK computer manufacturer Akhter has unveiled a range of all-in-one desktop systems, aimed primarily at the business and education market, which it says can consume just 55 watts, up to a third that of older PCs, while using Intel Core 2 Duo processors clocked at 3GHz, says Computing.co.uk.

According to Akhter, the new systems, branded LoCO2 PC, comply with the US Energy Star 4.0 benchmark, a joint programme set up by the US Environmental Protection Agency and Department of Energy to standardise energy-efficient products and practices.

"Everyone wants to claim they care about the environment and nobody wants to be seen to be wasting power," said Akhter's marketing manager Geoff Pick. "Our systems can save businesses significant amounts of money."

The Mobile Marketing Association has published its guidelines for advertising pushed over Bluetooth connections, and considers anyone who hasn't opted out to be fair game for spammers, reports The Register.

The guidelines are available for public review until 26 September, and take a distinct step beyond the UK's Direct Marketing Association (DMA) rules in that they consider any handset left in "discoverable" mode to be implicitly giving permission for pushed adverts - something the DMA explicitly rejects.

The document has been produced by the "Proximity Committee", a part of the Mobile Marketing Association, and is mostly concerned with an explanation of what Bluetooth is and how it can effectively be used.